


It's Complicated

by eon_s



Category: L.A. Noire
Genre: Body Dysmorphia, Body Image, But he's trying, Dehumanization, Discrimination, Dysfunctional Relationships, Emotional Baggage, I'm projecting hard onto Stefan here, Identity, Immigrant Feels, M/M, Masculinity, Muscles, Penis Size, Period Typical Attitudes, Period Typical Bigotry, Period-Typical Sexism, Polish-American feels, Self-Indulgent, Slurs, Stefan has got some baggage as a Pole that Cole just doesn't get, Stereotypes, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, also forgot to tag anxieties about feeling fetishized, also sex, also there's lots of weird intimacy, cole is a bit insufferable, ethnicity baggage, forgot to tag that, male body image issues, stefan has a big dick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-25 13:35:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30089898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eon_s/pseuds/eon_s
Summary: “It’s... not... it’s complicated. You wouldn’t –”“What, I wouldn’t understand?”He says it like he’s laughing, all offended disbelief, and it makes Stefan want to smack him. He buries that, but the frustration is intense and disruptive. Of course Cole would interpret that as a slight against his own brilliance and not at the fact that there’s just stuff he doesn’t get, growing up with a surname that anyone can spell and people don’t look twice at.(woo now the summary is just a quote from the fic, because I still can't summarize this. Just... Stefan. Angst. Cole being obtuse about it. Also feels. And sex.)
Relationships: Stefan Bekowsky/Cole Phelps
Kudos: 4





	It's Complicated

**Author's Note:**

> I have had so much angst over the years about my own 'Slavic-ness' and am learning to embrace it, but the way it reared up as I've gotten in shape for the same reasons has been really startling/surprising and quite sad. Which led me to thinking about why, (the comment he mentions re: his mom in this is based on stuff I heard in my own childhood tbh because people be judging other people's bodies hard for shit reasons) and about anti-Slavic sentiment more generally, and about Bekowsky because I fucking love this guy.
> 
> tl;dr lots of Polish-American immigrant feels that are near and dear to my Polish-Canadian heart, lots of weird masculinity and sexuality shit that's also near and dear to my heart. basically i'm just a big gay slav and have a lot of emotions ok? ok.

* * *

When Cole asks him about the free weights, Stefan doesn’t entirely know what to say in response. They’re just sitting there, out on his floor, from where he forgot to move them. He’d had a thought to put them away before Cole showed up, but anxieties over whatever it was they were doing, had been doing for a month now, distracted him to the point of forgetting.

The details, bluntly, were as follows. Two drunk, sad, and lonely men stumble home in the early morning. Two drunk, sad, lonely men duck into alleyway to piss. Stefan can’t help himself, takes a peek at the golden boy just to see how he measures up. Cole catches him and, rather than give him a fat lip, plants a kiss on his cheek, all clumsy and wet. Stefan being Stefan, prick still in his hand, thinks with said prick instead of with his brain and turns the goofy smooch into... something else.

They don’t talk about it for two weeks, until finally, Stefan decides to grab life by the balls and just confront Cole while they’re driving around on patrol. That progresses to them fighting, then Cole punching the dashboard hard enough to split a knuckle, and ends with him vengefully feeling Stefan up until he’s got all 7 inches of Bekowsky’s cock rock-hard under his hand.

This becomes something of a pattern. Cole gets pissy, Cole gets handsy. Stefan gets pissy, Stefan makes Cole shoot with his pants still on and is smug about it for days.

It starts as one-upmanship – admittedly, its competitiveness at the most fucked up that Stefan’s ever seen it, and neither of them really want to look to deeply as what kind of men it makes them, that this is how they communicate, but it makes Cole a little less of an asshole on the job, and reels in some of Stefan’s recklessness, and all in all, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Except this is different. This is Cole, at his door. Not a work night. Not even a weeknight. They could both be out with other people right now. Cole could be balls deep in his wife. Stefan could be balls deep in any number of women who’ve heard his reputation for not only having a big one, but knowing what to do with it. No – they’re in here, in his apartment, just a couple of queers subversively planning to do the highly un-American thing of eating some sandwiches, listening to the news, and then maybe having some sex.

His mind being sufficiently occupied, the weights were forgotten, but Cole’s here now, two sandwiches in a paper bag, hanging his hat up on the rack by the door, and he’s commenting on them.

“I didn’t know you work out.”

“I don’t,” Stefan says, and immediately curses himself. That’s stupid. That’s _really_ stupid. Maybe not stupid enough that it wouldn’t have worked on some broad with less than a high school education (Stefan can’t be faulted for having low standards – he never wants women around for so long they get tiresome, and the less they can keep up with him in the brains department, the better for everyone involved.) Won’t work on Cole sharp-as-a-tack Phelps.

“So what are they doing here?”

He’s doing that little frowny furrowy thing with his eyebrows and Stefan almost – almost – wants to ask him to leave, but he’s not going to. Whatever pit they’ve both fallen into, he’s in too deep to get himself out now.

“Sometimes I just take them out and look at them.”

He sounds so... weary saying it that Cole’s expression changes to something more like concern, even alarm. Stefan hastily plucks the bag from his hands and hurries to his tiny apartment’s postage stamp of a kitchen. He busies himself getting out plates and tries not to flinch when Cole walks over to join him.

“I’ve never known you to be interested in fitness.”

“Will you give it a rest?” Stefan snaps, irritable, “Okay, so I’m not in great shape. Maybe it bothers me sometimes.”

Cole inclines his head, pauses, then hmms softly.

“No,” he murmurs, mostly to himself, “No, that’s not it.”

_Jesus. There goes the evening._

“Cole –”

“You’re really smart, but you don’t push yourself. You’re physically capable, but you don’t push yourself. I don’t get it. Doesn’t it kill you, not being at your best?”

“No, because I’m not you.”

Stefan takes the sandwiches – now on plates – over to the sofa by the radio. He hands one of the plates to Cole with unneeded force.

“Are you angry with me?”

It doesn’t sound hurt or petulant like it would coming out of the mouth of a dame. It sounds... analytical, like Cole wants to crack his head open and look around inside.

“Will you leave it? Christ, you’re like a bloodhound, you really are. Pick your head up – go sniff something else for a while. We get it. You’re ambitious and I’m just a lazy Polack. Can we move on?”

The light goes on in Cole’s eyes like a fucking flashbulb and Stefan really, really wishes he’d just opted for some easy sister at a nightclub. Even an ugly one. Anything’d be better than being on the receiving end of Cole’s interrogation.

“It’s about that? I don’t – how does lifting weights have anything to do with you being Polish?” he asks.

“It’s... not... it’s complicated. You wouldn’t –”

“What, I wouldn’t understand?”

He says it like he’s laughing, all offended disbelief, and it makes Stefan want to smack him. He buries that, but the frustration is intense and disruptive. Of course Cole would interpret that as a slight against his own brilliance and not at the fact that there’s just stuff he doesn’t _get,_ growing up with a surname that anyone can spell and people don’t look twice at.

“Cole...” he sighs, but it’s pointless. He’s not got a leg to stand on, here. He could tell a woman to shut her trap and expect her to do it, but he knows Cole, knows him _intimately_ now. There’d be no stopping him. This’d just hang around until the weight of it wore Stefan through like an old pair of boots.

“My Ma’s a bigger woman, alright?”

Cole blinks, confused by the abrupt non sequitur.

“Alright?”

“She – we went out once. Her, and little me when I was... hell, I don’t know. Six? Seven? We went to get me some shoes – and I don’t know what possessed her but she saw these little ladies boots that went about... yea-high.” He marks halfway up his shin and Cole nods. “Well, I guess we must’ve had some money that year, or she was dreaming, but she decided to try ‘em. And the guy comes and she asks about them and he takes one look at her and says ‘not with those calves, you don’t. Won’t do no good, ma’am, and no offence meant and all that.’ _Polish calves,_ he called ‘em. And she was all flustered and she apologized a lot – paid for my shoes. We had to walk home because we didn’t have enough for the cab fare after all that, and while we were walking, she was gripping my hand real tight, and I realized she was crying, in broad daylight, just crying out in the open, walking down the street. I was too young to really understand it, of course – that you don’t say that to a lady, make her cry like that. If anyone tried to say something like that to my mother now... God help ‘em.”

Cole nods. This he can understand.

“No need to embarrass a woman publicly like that,” he agrees. “That store clerk was out of line.”

Damn it, he’s working on him. Working him over – like he’s a suspect.

“It’s just – I don’t know. I got a lot of it growing up. Not about my legs, obviously, nobody gives a damn about a grown man’s legs. But other things. You don’t try to let that stuff get to you, you know, but... I don’t know. You’re aware of it anyway.”

Just to have something to do, Stefan lights a cigarette and keeps his eyes on the far wall.

“Anyway – news’s coming on so –”

“What kind of things?”

He snarls a little.

“You just don’t know when to give up, do you? Things – right? You wouldn’t have heard ‘em. What good’s it do, digging all that up?”

“You’re letting me. Clearly that means something.”

 _As if I could stop you,_ he thinks, but that’s not the truth of it. Cole is stubborn, sure, but Stefan could steamroll him if he had to. Maybe it’d cause an argument, almost certainly it’d take sex off the table – and what the hell’s it say, to think that’s part of why he doesn’t want to get on Cole’s bad side now?

“What the hell are we doing?” he breathes more quietly, staring at the end of his cigarette as if it holds some kind of answer.

“Right now or in general?”

“Shit, Phelps, I don’t know.”

Cole grimaces, fidgeting a bit. He takes a dissatisfied bite of his sandwich, chews, and swallows.

“I don’t know either.”

The words sit between them like some unsightly, malodorous thing – nasty and impossible to ignore. Before too long, Cole reaches for one of Stefan’s cigarettes. _Smoke your own,_ he thinks, but lets him. _Sure, to hell with it. Take my matches too. Take my damn sentimental heart while you’re at it – that’d really kill me._

“Look, I’m sorry I touched a nerve. I didn’t mean to... to dig into you like that.”

“It’s fine.”

“It isn’t – I know, it’s... insufferable. I’m insufferable, sometimes. I do know that – I’m not totally oblivious.”

“No one’s ever said you were,” Stefan replies guardedly, but inside he’s confused. Unsettled. Cole is being... not _soft_ with him but... more tender than he’s used to, in a man. And God help him, he doesn’t mind it half as much as he should. _Shit._

“Alright. You want details, here’s details,” he finds himself saying, like rubbing salt in a wound. “I’m lazy by choice. And yeah, I get called lazy because I’m Polish, much as I get called stubborn because I’m Polish, much as I get called... well lots of things. But that’s better, I find, than the alternative.”

“Which is?”

“Which is... every guy in my family and most of the women are built... stocky, I guess you might say. I’m on the thinner side, to tell you the truth. Again – by choice. I tried getting fit – really fit – once. I even quit smoking. Did the whole health thing. Just to see if I could.”

“And?”

Cole’s looking at him seriously, but at least some of the ‘cop’ has gone out of him. Now he just looks like a person.

“I didn’t like it. I would look at myself in the mirror and I’d see –” and for a second, his throat closes and he can’t talk, and doesn’t that just beat all? He coughs, shakes his head, and tries another angle.

“You know what they say around the precinct about...”

He gestures vaguely in the direction of his groin. Of course Cole knows – everyone who’s ever shared a men’s room with Stefan, or worked with someone who has, knows. He gets everything from jokes to genuine jealousy in response, but up until now, he’s never dared – not with anyone – to say he’s anything but happy about it. Who wouldn’t be?

“Does that bother you? I never really thought – I guess it is embarrassing, in a way. I just took it for the kind of ribbing you get in locker rooms – back in the service there was a guy who’d get similar – he was bigger – I mean – he couldn’t even find girls to...”

Cole trails off. He’s flushed now, eyes averted, and Stefan wishes they could just be necking on the couch already instead of wading through all this shit, but has no idea how to change course now.

“They make me feel like an animal,” he spits finally, and fuck, a shiver, an actual shiver goes through him, saying it out loud. _Have I really never said it before? I’ve_ _ **felt**_ _it. Is this really the first time I’ve –_

“All the little comments like – like I’m at a stockyard or something. Like a bull. It’s not just that, it’s a lot of things. I was always a bigger kid, you know. Chubby at first, but then my balls dropped and I got... big. Strong. Stronger than most of the kids in my class. And there were these... compliments. But they never felt like compliments, see? They were more... I don’t know. Here’s some big stupid Slav built like a brick shithouse. Want to see how many heavy things he can lift? _Strong as an ox._ Don’t ask him what he thinks, for Christ’s sake – no. Just assume he’s too dumb _to_ think. Strong and dumb with a big cock and no brains to speak of. And I looked in that mirror that one day and – and I guess I finally saw it. Saw it like they did. And I hated it. So after that I just took to... being lazy. I just haven’t gotten around to getting rid of the weights, yet.”

Stefan only realizes his hands are shaking when Cole’s is in his, and the thoughts of _we’re holding hands like we’re –_ and _what the hell good is me getting all weepy gonna do –_ meet in the middle of his mind like two freight trains on a collision course, and the result is that he opens his mouth to speak and finds that he’s momentarily forgotten how.

“I don’t think you’re stupid, Bekowsky.”

And that’s the most infuriating part of the whole thing so far – that Cole says that as if it makes one lick of difference what he, Cole Phelps, thinks, in a world of people who just see Stefan as an uncouth, unwanted interloper coming to – to steal their job or their girl or whatever the hell people think he’s fixing to steal, exactly. But then, again, it’s Cole. _Cole._ And maybe he does have enough innate talent and power to change the minds of the whole of America. Who knows? In this very minute, this precious spell of tenderness (that, for all it’s being given to him on a platter still feels to Stefan like the most stolen thing of all he’s ever managed to grab for himself,) Stefan feels like maybe Cole _could_ do it. And that’s stupid – really stupid – the kind of stupid that’d get a guy put away for doing the wrong kind of thinking about the wrong kind of people. It’s stupid in the way that holding hands is stupid and helping your buddy get his gun off isn’t. The way his heart gives a little shimmy at the fact that Cole used his surname just then not to dismiss him but to... hell, he doesn’t have a word for it. Celebrate him? That sounds ridiculous but that’s how it feels. Well that’s the most dangerous, _stupid_ thing of all.

“I don’t feel too smart, doing this,” Stefan admits, and lifts their joined hands to emphasize his point. Cole flinches back, face pinched in agreement, and privately, they both mourn the loss despite the inevitable necessity of it.

“What _are_ we doing, anyway?” he reiterates, the earlier question still unresolved.

Cole stubs out his cigarette, loosens his tie, and shrugs. He picks up his sandwich, stares at it, then puts it back.

“God, I don’t know.” He smirks sadly. “Not the worst thing I’ve ever done. Not the safest, I’ll give you that, but I’m not...” he gropes for the word. “I’m not unsatisfied with this. With uh... us.”

“Is this an ‘us’ kind of thing?”

Cole wets his lower lip with his tongue and Stefan curses himself for following it with his eyes so hungrily.

“Do you... do you want it to be?”

“God damn it, Cole,” Stefan hisses, frustration and arousal fighting each other. “You can’t keep twisting things around on me. It’s not fair, you always acting like you’ve got nothing on the line while I –”

Cole hauls him forwards by his tie and kisses him. Hard. Hard enough that he drops his cigarette onto the couch and manages to burn a hole through the upholstery.

“You clumsy son of a bitch, this couch came with the apartment,” Stefan growls once they break apart, but his heart’s not in it. Far from it – his heart is dancing around the room like a happy idiot, doing handsprings, even. His voice is giving him away, all low and breathy. Cole doesn’t even need to touch him to know. Shit. _Shit._ One kiss and he’s gone. What a royal mess they’ve both gotten into.

“Tell them you fell asleep smoking,” Cole suggests, inching closer. His hand is warm and bold, confidently sliding up the outside of his leg.

“Cole – we can’t just keep fooling around without ever talking about this,” Stefan begins, then nearly howls as Cole’s fingertips tickle over the front of his pants.

“Okay,” Cole says cruelly, moving his hand away. “We can stop.”

“That’s not – that’s not what I meant.”

“What do you mean? I don’t have any more answers than you do, Stefan.”

“Yeah but you’re smarter than me.”

And there it is. He can see the moment that the other shoe finally drops. Cole’s face goes from teasing to serious all over again.

“Stefan. I _don’t_ think you’re stupid.”

“It’s not about you, Phelps! You’re just one guy. You could believe I was purple and had six eyes and ten noses and it wouldn’t change anything.”

Cole frowns at this. He’s almost pouting.

“I don’t think that’s a fair assessment.”

 _Good Christ._ How can someone be so attractive and so fucking irritating at the same time? _He doesn’t get it. He won’t. He can’t.  
_

“Let me just – let me try something.”

_Oh, here we go._

“I’m not stopping you.”

“Take off your pants.”

“Cole.”

“Stefan. I’m – I know what I’m doing.”

That’s funny – that’s actually laughable. If there’s one certainty in any of this it is that neither man has any idea what they’re doing, any idea at all.

“Sure, what the hell?” Stefan sighs indulgently and lifts his hips up, stripping without any particular finesse. He keeps up the all-practicality angle as he gets his cuff-links out of his sleeves and hands them to Cole.

“Don’t let me lose these. If they roll off the coffee table, I’ll never find them again.”

Cole settles on putting them in his shirt pocket as Stefan gets down to underpants and an undershirt.

“Don’t let me stop you,” Cole insists. “Keep going.”

Fine then. Soon, he’s naked except for his socks and the garters holding them up, hugging his thick calves. Now that he’s thought about that – his Ma and her calves, he can’t help but feel like his must look enormous. _It’s a miracle they sold any garters that fit,_ he thinks distantly as Cole’s hands knead the meat of his thighs.

“You _are_ strong,” Cole says, and Stefan pulls back a bit, startled and hurt. “I think it suits you – looks... very good.”

“I think I don’t much care to talk about it one way or another,” Stefan replies, an edge in his voice. It’s Cole’s turn to look hurt and Stefan hates the way that makes him feel. Like he’s the bad guy, like he has to – has to justify himself. _I just hate you looking at me like that._

“I don’t think you’re just brute strength, Stephan – you don’t have to interpret it that way. I just like it. I like how you look.”

“Yeah, well, thanks.”

It comes out bitter.

“I just – 'you’ve got a big dick, Stefan,' 'I love your chest hair, Stefan' – doesn’t feel that different from the rest of it. I didn’t _do_ anything to look like this. It’s not anything I’ve got to be proud of.”

Cole sits back, analyzing.

“What are you proud of? No – don’t make that face. I’m serious.”

Stefan’s a little embarrassed by how long it takes him to come up with an answer, and Cole just sitting there _waiting_ makes it worse.

“I... I’m the first cop in my family, that I know of anyway. There might have been one I never heard about in the old country, a cousin or something, but I doubt it. Ma and Pa just did menial labour, odd jobs when they came here. I make more than both of them combined. And I – I know I’m not ambitious, and even if I was I doubt I’d make it much higher than I have now. But I’m proud I can – I can set something aside for them. Every month. Make their lives a little more... livable.”

Cole considers this.

“You’re right.”

“I know I am. What about?” Stefan grins, but he falters and sucks in a sharp breath when Cole wraps a hand around him.

“It’s smart you pretend to be lazy. If the competition knew you were good-looking, funny, and such a damn good person, they’d probably jam your typewriter keys out of spite.”

Stefan shakes his head.

“You really... think all that? About me. Shit, the War must’ve knocked some of your screws loose.”

“I’m serious, Bekowsky.”

And there it is again. That funny little way he says his name like he likes the taste of it. Stefan swallows.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Maybe I’m certifiable, I don’t know, I’m not a doctor, but I’m deadly serious. I wouldn’t do this for any other guy. Never have. Never did – not during the War, not before, not after. But you’ve got something that... challenges me. Makes me take my head out of my ass from time to time. I admire that.”

It’s weird. It’s not a pep talk, and it’s not some kind of hot stuff you’d whisper to a girl you were gonna got to bed with. It’s different. It’s... both, somehow, and whatever it is, it’s working wonders.

“You keep that up, I’m gonna have more than just a cigarette burn on this couch to explain later.”

Cole moves, leans, and Stefan thinks he’s died and gone to – well, not Heaven. But somewhere good, anyway. Cole’s mouth – that perfect little mouth – is just – just inches from –

“We can’t have you making a mess,” he says, and then fuck, fuck, fuck, Stefan is bellowing and he doesn’t even have time to warn Cole – Cole hasn’t even fully got his lips around him yet – and he has to back off, choking and coughing, and the last pulse gets him across the cheek, marks him. Stefan’s never seen a prettier sight. It’s so swell that he actually doesn’t have any room left in his mind for feeling sheepish for having gone off so fast. Cole seems equal parts put out and amused by it.

“The least you could do is give me your handkerchief,” he complains. “I’m not ruining mine with all this.

“Just use my undershirt – it’s closer.”

“That’s –” Cole shakes his head, bemused. “Alright.”

He wipes off his face as Stefan basks in the warm afterglow.

“Come here,” Stefan says fondly, “I wanna kiss you.”

“I just had your cock in my mouth.”

“Cole, I think we passed the threshold of what two normal men oughtta be doing together a long time ago. I don’t care if you don’t.”

“Alright,” Cole repeats, and hauls himself back up onto the couch and into Stefan’s lap. He’s still hard, and Stefan takes hold of him without much fanfare.

“You’re a conundrum,” he rambles. “You know that? You really get under my skin and I just can’t figure out what it is. You’re just so... you.”

“Uh, thank you?”

“I don’t know, don’t listen to me. I’m just –”

“Not – ah – stupid,” Cole replies, breath hitching as Stefan’s hand burrows past his flies and grabs him.

“I was gonna say ‘worn out’ but I appreciate the vote of confidence.”

He rubs the pad of his thumb over the bead of fluid gathered at the tip of Cole’s prick, taking time to marvel at how it doesn’t feel disgusting in the least. _We’re both doomed,_ he thinks wryly. _I’d do just about anything for him and he’s just as good as told me the same. Hell’s bells. Might as well make the best of it._ He buries his face in Cole’s neck, breathing in that magical blend of pomade, aftershave, and fresh sweat that’s started to condition him to involuntary arousal. He bites low on Cole’s throat where he’s sure a collar’ll cover it, and Cole whines and spills, hot, over his knuckles. It’s an almost suicidal impulse that makes him bend over and kiss the tip of Cole’s cock, curious about what it’ll taste like and only realizing afterwards how much harder it is to explain the gesture away since Cole had already finished. It was extraneous, an indulgence. A tell. Stefan’s not much of a poker player – reveals too much in his eyes – but it doesn’t take a genius to know he’s shown his whole hand in that one false move.

“Well.”

They’ve crossed more lines tonight than just cock-sucking and they know it.

“Well.”

“Maybe we are both stupid,” Cole remarks, sounding a little deflated and grim for someone in the immediate aftermath of what they’ve been up to. “No, scratch that. I think I can say with certainty we’re both stupid.”

Stefan grunts in agreement, too shattered to form words. Cole nudges him clumsily.

“Not because you’re a Pole, though.”

“No, because _of my pole,_ ” he says, and it’s a cheap joke but Cole actually snorts at it so it’s worth it.

“That was low-brow even for you.”

“You laughed. That makes you as bad off as I am.”

They’re not talking about the joke anymore.

“I guess I am, huh?”

Stefan sits up with a groan and grabs his discarded sandwich.

“What’d you get – salami?”

“Mm. That alright?”

“Sure. Food’s food. You want a cup of coffee or something?”

“That’d be nice.”

Cole turns the radio on and the sound of the end of the newscast fills the apartment. Stefan opens a kitchen cupboard and pauses, then closes it and opens another. It’s a weird night. Might as well use the good dishware for a change. It’s a small gesture, sure, but its importance, to Stefan, is paramount. Somehow, Cole has become the first lover he’s taken worthy of unchipped ceramic. He sets the matching mugs beside each other on the counter and stares at them in a state of silent unease until the water boils.


End file.
